“I watched a lot of ‘Keeping Up with the Kardashians’ and ‘The Hills,’ and I tried to understand the psychology of this kind of girl as much as possible,” she tells reporters at the Cannes Film Festival, via Us Weekly. “I didn’t want her to be just a parody. The accent was hard as it was a particular kind of dialect. I also thought a lot about what her parents must have been like.”

Watson clarifies that “The Bling Ring” isn’t a “heist movie,” but is instead a look at why the real-life Bling Ring gang stole from Hollywood’s elite. “It was about how these kids wanted to pretend for just two hours or so that they were actually Paris Hilton and living that life,” she says.

“The Bling Ring” premiered during Cannes’ opening night on May16. It’s due in theaters in limited release starting June 14.